BlackBoxed
by Nanaki BH
Summary: Reno/Rufus - Reno begins to wonder what has separated him and Rufus.


**Disclaimer: **_Final Fantasy VII_ and all related character and materials are property of Square-Enix.

Black-Boxed  
By: Nanaki BH

Dull black shoes, scuffed from wear, silently graced the gray sidewalk, traversing through the sea of grayer people, leading him toward his destination. Reno was not a busy man. By no meaning of the word would he be considered busy, even when he claimed to be. Busy doing very little, perhaps, but busy doing little else. Yet he walked as if he had somewhere to be and people would part, glaring or averting their eyes.

That was fine. He was never much liked anyway, never much wanted. If he could distance himself enough, that meant he never had to deal with separation.

Somewhere else, the world was turning yellow and orange. Leaves were falling and things were getting colder. Always somewhere else. Things were probably better there, too. Or perhaps not. He wasn't sure if weather changes necessarily made something _better_ or if it just made it more real somehow.

This place didn't feel real. Not _right_, anyhow. Not anymore.

Somewhere else, the leaves were turning red and Rufus was too. So to speak.

Their relationship had dampened somehow. The president? Dead? On first thought: good. After about a week: not at all. Hardly a day after his father's funeral and Rufus was having a _parade_. Reno never admired Rufus' tact, but that was, to Reno at least, a very bitch move. He flew him there, kept his mouth shut just as long as it meant Rufus would sit next to him. The whole while, he wondered what he could be thinking about.

The thing that killed Reno the most was that it probably wasn't him.

He felt selfish. Wasn't he allowed to be? He felt jealous. But of what? Who? His dead father, for stealing his son's attention away from him without even trying to? That's how it would have been anyway. One way or another. Sooner or later. (And Gaia, how he wished it would have been sooner, as separation without separation was worse than being without him at all.)

What was it if it weren't physical? What was it keeping him at arm's length? Power? Greed? Fortune? Was it all of that?

Reno walked stiffly the rest of the way back, fists clenched tightly at his sides, leaving in his wake an abused garbage can and a crowd of very surprised slum dwellers.

Admitting that he had been staring at Rufus' office door for nearly an entire hour later that day would have probably spelled defeat. He couldn't place exactly what it was that made Rufus so different now. He was still just as sharp tongued, just as precise in everything he did. Although certainly not his best qualities, that hadn't changed or gotten worse. He didn't want to say it was arrogance, as that felt too much like the shortcut to the wrong answer.

His hand finally reached for the doorknob, conceding that it was just something that would go without explaining and had no explanation to start with. Rufus was Rufus, as simple and complicated as he had ever been. But goddammit, what made him so _angry_ now? His hand was shaking on the doorknob and he grit his teeth, forcing himself to open it and step inside.

Rufus kept his eyes on his work, his pen busily dashing across the page as if the paper would run away if he lifted his hand. How could something so monotonous, so boring keep his attention for so long? No sooner had they gotten "home" had Rufus emerged himself up to his nose in work again. Where did this work come from anyway? The knot forming in Reno's throat made him want to shout out. Shout, "_Hey I'm here, can't you see me, boss?"_ or "_You're a damned idiot, you know that?"_

He managed to keep himself tight lipped and in check with sheer willpower alone. There wasn't much else keeping him from lunging across his desk at him. The _president's_ desk.

What a joke.

A million hate-filled things crossed his mind at that moment, so many things he knew he didn't really think.

"_Who do you think you are, your father?"_

No. Untrue. He couldn't say that. Shouldn't think that. He knew how much he hated him. He wasn't doing this to be like him. Besides, he ruled in a completely different way. Right? That's what everybody else said, huddled in their corners, whimpering amongst themselves.

That was it on the surface. This man, so stuck on his business that everything else seemed irrelevant, he was not the person others thought he was. To the prying eyes, he was a monster with no emotion. They had never seen him turn his head in shame, eyelashes glistening, nor felt him shudder, trying to hold fast to whatever stability he could manage.

They didn't understand. And maybe he didn't either.

And that's why he sat down, abandoning any of those thoughts and just sat. Sat and listened to the sounds his pen made as it swiped across the surface of the desk.

Reno forgot what this was like. It could have been that Rufus was always like this. As a member of only a couple weeks, he recalled the time he first met Rufus. Sitting across from his father in the boardroom, Rufus had kept quietly to himself, hands folded on the table as if in prayer. Praying, probably, for his father to take a vacation. Forever. So said the look on his face and the posture he held, but more importantly, Reno remembered the way their eyes met. It probably wasn't as romantic as he remembered it, but memories are known to be subjective.

He was always a self-important bastard. Those eyes said as much. "Don't get too involved," they said, but Reno didn't listen. He was an idiot like that. That's what made them perfect for each other, he thought.

The pen stopped.

Rufus had changed colors as well.

The look on his face was neither exhaustion nor resignation, but read somewhere in between. He let the pen slip from his fingers and he pushed a hand through his hair, a sigh that felt like dead leaves escaping his lips.

He hadn't the need to say a word before Reno was at his side, enveloping him, pulling him in, kissing him hard. When the mask fell, this was his Rufus. No president. This was the person Reno saw behind those eyes, the person he loved, the person Rufus tried to forget he was. No façades, no pretending. In some ways, Reno wished it could always be like this, with this level of honesty, but he knew that without it, they would lose their place.

Time felt slow with fingers tracing over delicate skin, hungry eyes desperately trying to record every moment. The floor was certainly not the best place, but any place was good enough for a moment like this. Especially when he needed to feel him so badly.

Reno wondered when he'd gone so soft. Rufus' head pillowed on his chest, his eyes closing, fingers tightening slightly on his arms... It was hard not to find the answer with it right under his nose like that, in the most literal of senses.

It was cold everywhere else, but not in Midgar.

* * *

Been a while since I wrote anything for them, huh? Hope you guys enjoyed reading!


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